The present invention generally relates to methods and circuits for displaying information in an optical display systems. More specifically, the invention relates to a method and circuit for controlling information displayed in optical display installation in a program-controlled apparatus, for example, a telecommunications apparatus, wherein both information to be displayed and currently displayed information are stored in a memory, and the information to be displayed is prioritized with respect to priority of display.
In German Offenlegungsschrift DE-OS 3724613, incorporated herein by reference, there is disclosed a method for the optical display of processes that are independent of a connection to and of processes that accompany a connection on the display of a digital telecommunication terminal apparatus suited for speech and/or data transmission. The terminal apparatus is provided with several subunits for automatically carrying out of determinate connection-independent or connection-accompanying processes via a display control, which processes are initiated by external events or by internal events formed by actuating numeric keys, function keys and name keys. Various display priorities and minimum display pages are allocated to the processes initiated by the external or internal events. After the termination of the minimum display, the display priority of the displayed process can be temporally changed, whereby the display priority of the current display is reduced step-by-step.
The display priority of the currently displayed process is repeatedly compared with the display priorities of processes to be displayed. After carrying out the priority comparison, the process with the highest display priority is displayed on the display. By this method, at least two different process designations are cyclically displayed. Likewise, displays of a single process designation can be cyclically displayed. In contrast, processes of different display priorities cannot be displayed at the same time.
An object of the present invention is to indicate a method and a circuit arrangement that make it possible to use an optical display installation in an expanded scope.
To that end, in an embodiment the invention provides a method for controlling information to be displayed in an optical display installation in a program-controlled apparatus comprising the steps of storing in a memory information to be displayed and currently displayed information, and allocating display priority levels to the information to be displayed, and displaying information with a higher priority level with a higher priority in relation to information with a lower priority level, whereby the priority level of displayed information can be changed, information with different priority levels comprising a concurrent information subset.
The invention provides numerous advantages. It enables the display of information in a temporal sequence according to different display priorities, as well as simultaneous display of further information. In addition to these display possibilities, which are not provided in the prior art, the control program of the display installation control unit, which implements the inventive method, can be constructed in a simple way.
Yet further, due to the fact that information to be displayed can be stored as a subset of stored information to be displayed with different further information in different priority levels, these information subsets can also be further displayed in a priority-conditioned manner.
These and other features of the invention are discussed in greater detail below in the following detailed description of the presently preferred embodiments with reference to the accompanying drawings.